A Passion for Science - Columbia College - Columbia University

CLASS NOTES Columbia CollEgE Today
in the North Carolina mountains,
where it should have been cold,
but it wasn’t. When we returned to
Durham, we learned that we had
missed temperatures that reached
79 degrees!
“So what about me? You could
say (because it is true) that my research
is taking a more biomedical
twist as I explore the changes in
brain structure and function among
the children (now young adults) I
have been following for 25 years
who experienced child abuse or
neglect. Like the pilgrim looking
for an honest man, I am looking for
grant funds to continue MRI studies
on as many as consent to participate.
As we look at the prospect of
cuts in health and social services for
low-income children and families,
documenting the permanent functional
and anatomical changes that
growing up in abusive households
may lead to might move some
stony hearts.”
I received a brief note from henry
welt. I am overdue in tracking
Henry down for lunch or dinner
some night. Henry wrote: “I resumed
practicing law last spring and
am having a great time. Somehow, it
seems to give me more pleasure as I
get older — maybe just a better perspective
— and it is challenging and
fun. At the same time, I’ve expanded
my art licensing and brand management
business, WeltAdvisors, and
now work with several artist clients.
Also, I had a great time taking an
alumni mini-Core course on Contemporary
Civilization. It made me
feel like I was back on campus. All in
all, life is good.”
It is hard to believe that this
summer I will turn 65, and I guess
others in the class will do so too. I
suspect our class will have lots to
report for three more decades or
so. Do send in a note. My sentence
for this job may be commuted at
some point before then. I hope all
of you are enjoying each day. And
if you can, go to a football game
this fall. I predict a great season.
69
Michael oberman
Kramer Levin Naftalis &
Frankel
1177 Avenue of the
Americas
New York, NY 10036
moberman@
kramerlevin.com
I was paging through the State Bar
News for New York one recent night
and found on its back cover a photo
of John Marwell in an ad for the
Bar Association. I promptly asked
him for the “back story” and for
some news; John replied: “Michael
— no cover boy back story — I
was as surprised as anyone when I
opened the State Bar News and was
confronted with that larger-than-life
photo.
“I feel that we are at the age at
which we recognize and appreciate
our good fortune and the progress
of our children. Jeremy (Yale, Cambridge
and NYU Law) completed
his clerkship this summer with
Justice Sonia Sotomayor on the
Supreme Court, a great privilege
and an immensely rewarding experience.
He now is with Vinson &
Elkins in its Washington, D.C., office
in a small group doing appellate
and regulatory practice. He married
the wonderful Jillian Lawrence,
who is an attorney with Pepco.
Jonathan (Bates College) is enjoying
life as a bachelor commercial
real estate broker in Westchester,
and Julie (Cornell and St. George’s
University School of Medicine) is
in her third year of medical school
doing her clinical rotations at New
York Methodist Hospital in Park
Slope. Gloria and I celebrated our
25th anniversary this summer with
Judge Nicholas Garaufis generously
and graciously conducting
our vow renewal ceremony in the
Adirondacks.
“I practice law in Mount Kisco
when not engaged in bar association
activities. Gloria continues to
push forward as a real estate broker
in Westchester and Fairfield counties
and has become a cowgirl, as
she has taken up riding cutting
horses as a hobby (yes, like in City
Slickers) and is competing in shows
in Florida, New Jersey, Pennsylvania
and New York. Some of her
shows are on YouTube.”
steve conway ’71 GSAS was
kind enough to e-mail me about the
January/February column, so I, of
course, asked him for some news.
From Steve: “I exited Columbia
College and GSAS with liberal arts
degrees and no career in mind.
Since then I’ve had more than 30
jobs in university teaching and administration,
and then in business,
that I’ve almost always enjoyed. At
61, I joined Boston-based industry
analyst firm IDC as research v.p.
for the supercomputer market. This
might be my last paid gig. A big
pleasure in the past couple of years
was reconnecting and then staying
connected with my CC roommates
pesach slabosky, a celebrated artist
living in Jerusalem; rick altabef,
one of the top legal eagles at CBS;
and Jim llana, recently named
associate provost of institutional
effectiveness at the City University
of New York. To you and everyone
in our class and their kith and kin,
I mainly wish good health. We all
used to wonder at aging relatives
who seemed obsessed with health
talk, and now we’re learning more
what that’s all about. The last exercise
people of my parents’ generation
seemed to get was reaching out
MAY/JUNE 2011
60
for their diplomas. Our generation,
at least those who could, continued
exercising and that might help us in
the long run. End of sermonette.”
Since he became a U.S. District
Court judge for the Eastern District
of New York (sitting in Brooklyn),
Nick Garaufis’ decisions have become
a frequent subject for articles
in the New York Law Journal, and are
occasionally in the news pages and
even are in the editorial pages of
the city’s daily newspapers. Still, I
was surprised to see in the New York
Post of March 6 a story titled “Judge
Garaufis’ mob ties.” Turns out Nick
is presiding over a murder trial of
an individual convicted of a prior
murder, and the defendant somehow
had not been provided with
a tie to wear during jury selection.
Nick solved the problem by loaning
a Brooks Brothers tie to the defendant,
prompting the Post to craft a
Post-like headline.
I sent out a blast e-mail to those
who had served on our 40th
Reunion Committee, inviting comments
on how the Core courses
continue to influence us, and for
news. Jim weitzman responded:
“I was elated to get an e-mail from
a fellow alumnus announcing
WKCR’s 70th Anniversary Dinner
on February 24 in Roone Arledge
Auditorium. Without even looking
at what was already in the calendar,
I immediately made a reservation.
On campus, I spent almost as much
time at KCR as I did sitting in class.
The highlight of my tenure was
having the privilege of producing
a live weekly broadcast from
Greenwich Village’s Cafe Feenjon
every Saturday night at midnight.
It exposed this Wisconsin kid to a
variety of Mediterranean cultures
and people. I could say that WKCR
and the Feenjon ultimately formed
the basis of my second career:
owning and operating a group of
radio stations featuring primarily
multicultural/multilingual programming.
I’ve recently finished a
grueling couple of years in the planning,
financing, zoning, permitting
and construction of the latest one, a
50,000-watt station near Washington’s
Dulles Airport that took to the
air in March. I’m forever grateful
for the Columbia education that
opened my mind to embrace the
diversity that provided the foundation
for this line of work.”
Joe Materna wrote: “My wife,
Dolores, and I recently celebrated
our 35th anniversary by taking an
extensive tour of Russia, Poland
and the Scandinavian countries
of Sweden, Denmark, Norway,
Finland and Tallin, Estonia. It was
a beautiful trip. My favorites were
the State Hermitage Museum and
the Catherine Palace, both located
in St. Petersburg, Russia, and Tivoli
Gardens (which is like Walt Disney
World but built in 1843) in Copenhagen.
However, having a drink
at the ‘Ice Bar’ in Copenhagen was
also quite an experience and a lot
of fun. I recommend it highly! On
a professional note, I am pleased
to announce that in the January
Avenue Magazine, I was named to
the Avenue’s Legal Elite list of New
York City’s top trusts and estates
attorneys. I also recently was honored
by Martindale-Hubbell with
its Peer Review Rated for Legal
Ability and Ethical Standards
Award for being an attorney having
a Martindale-Hubbell AV Preeminent
Rating for more than 20
continuous years. I am honored to
have received both awards.
“After 37 years as a Law Schooltrained
practicing attorney, I still
love my job. I enjoy doing premier
trusts and estates work at my Wall
Street law firm in Manhattan, where
I continue to be the ‘confidant’
and ‘personal trusted family adviser’
who is attentive, supportive,
sympathetic and responsive to the
needs of my many affluent clients
in both New York and Florida.
Meeting with my clients, becoming
well-acquainted with them and
their families, knowing their history,
hearing their stories, earning their
trust, and legally and skillfully protecting
their wealth and estate assets
for them and their families for
years to come are the most rewarding
aspects of my work. Getting
to know the client as a person, not
only as a file, is extremely important
and satisfying to me as a T&E attorney.
Above all, however, is the fact
that I always will be thankful to Columbia
College for giving me that
solid foundation that has helped to
make all of my past, present and
future accomplishments possible.
My Columbia daughters, Jodi ’99,
Jennifer ’02 and Janine ’05, also are
doing well. I am pleased and proud
to report that all three of them are
active in their respective classes.”
I received a number of comments
about the Core courses. From dave
sokal: “I remember reading David
Hume — or maybe John Locke —
and gaining an understanding of a
quote that I can’t now recall exactly
about how we often don’t appreciate
the influence of dead philosophers
on today’s conventional
wisdom.”
From dave rosedahl: “Don
Quixote. Fantasies are fun … sometimes
become real. Who’d have
believed the Germans would own
the NYSE? Pursue your dreams.”
And Mark webber, who has an
amazing recall of our college days
(with specific dates), reminded
me of an escapade the two of us
engaged in when the pages began
to fall from our copies of the Rabelais
book in freshman year. We
wrote to Penguin Press in the style